


Coward

by ScribeOfReaper



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, I REGRET NOTHING, Well maybe a little, Zack Fair Needs a Hug, he kind of gets one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:22:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23935288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScribeOfReaper/pseuds/ScribeOfReaper
Summary: General Sephiroth: Mission refused.How can one sentence cause so much pain?
Relationships: Zack Fair & Sephiroth
Comments: 8
Kudos: 38





	Coward

**Author's Note:**

> I think this one can be summarised easily:  
> SUFFER!

He didn’t want to think about how many days it had been. He didn’t want to think about the mission details. He didn’t want to think about the collateral damage, or the casualties lost.

He just, didn’t want to think…but the report is sitting there, right in front of him. The sheets of neat white paper stacked atop his desk, waiting for his signature so it can be filed away and forgotten about.

Maybe it would be easier if he just got it over with, didn’t even look at the words staring up at him against a backdrop of stark white. The line is right there, at the bottom of the page, the pens already in his hand.

It stays there, unmoving, apart from the slight tremble that runs along its length. Oh wait, it’s his hand that’s trembling not the pen.

Frustrated anger rears its head like a viper, biting into him, making him squeeze the pen just this side of too tight. It snaps like a frail twig and ink drenches the report in monochrome spatters of deep black.

Instinctively he’s reaching for it, trying to save it, but it’s a lost cause and he already knows it. So, of course he’s grabbing the napkins left over from the untouched takeout Kunsel brought him ages ago; dabbing at the paper as though its instantly going to be clean again.

It’s as he’s swiping across the top, trying not to turn a relatively small ink blot into a smear of black all across the title, that the name catches his eye. Right next to the word ‘refused’ in big bold letters.

He tears the paper.

First in half then into quarters, again and again until he’s left with nothing more than ink stained confetti. It’s going to be a nightmare to clean, he doesn’t care.

* * *

A new copy of the reports waiting for him the next day when he walks into his office, this time with a little yellow post-it note—oh good, he hasn’t earned the red post-it note of doom yet—attached to the top of it.

He ignores it, for as long as he can. Places it off to the side as he sorts through the rest of his paperwork—who knew making First meant more paperwork, he feels cheated—and double checks it. Cleans and oils the Buster sword, then reconfigures the materia he has equipped. Checks his mail, then the fan groups and regrets that choice immediately, he’s pretty sure he hears something break when he flips his phone shut.

It’s around lunch after his third session of squats when he finally turns his attention to the neglected report.

He tells himself he’s just going to skim it to check for any major errors—if there’s even a typo Zack knows Lazard will have it back on his desk within the hour, this time with a red post-it—or missing details.

His eyes lock onto the same name from yesterday.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, just staring at the sentence.

It’s not like its new information to him, but something about seeing the words: ‘General Sephiroth: Mission Refused’ in plain black and white makes it more real.

The frustrated anger from yesterday is rising again.

Dropping the sheet, he walks to the space in front of his desk that’s become the unofficial ‘squat zone’ in his office. He starts off quick, swinging his arms with more force than necessary, throwing off his balance and his pace as his weight swings forward unexpectedly. Unsurprisingly, he’s flat on his butt in the next second and on the way down he manages to clip his head against the only sharp edge of the desk; the one he made when he’d been swinging around the Buster sword when he first got this office.

“Damn it!” His fist meets the side of the way too fancy—that clearly cost more than a few gil—desk before he realises what he’s doing. The dent he leaves is more than sizeable; if he’s being honest, he thinks he’s compromised the things structural integrity. He pokes the dent…yep, creaking wood, he can definitely hear strained creaking wood and something—if he had to take a guess at it—that sounds like metal snapping.

The desk gives way with a whimpering groan that makes Zack feel a little sorry for it. That feeling dies faster than a Bomb dumped in the sea when the report slides off the desk and into his lap.

The angers back.

In truth it never left, not since Modeoheim.

Not since…

He’s standing, making for the door with the report in his hand. The corridors go past in a blur as he stomps his way through them, sending more than one SOLDIER scurrying to the side. When he reaches the elevator, he presses the call button so hard he’s pretty sure he’s dented the metal; Shinra’s own fault for not making them SOLDIER proof, he doesn’t care. What he does care about is the fact that it’s taking so long for the doors to open.

He’s about to turn and try his luck with the other elevator—seriously, why the hell do the emergency stairs only go to the 59th floor—when the door finally opens to the sound of a high pitched ding that really grates against Zack’s last good nerve.

The trip down seems to take longer than usual and the annoying music they have playing in the elevator, which he can usually ignore, seems louder than normal.

There’s a small voice in the back of his mind—a voice that sounds so painfully familiar—that’s telling him that his angers simply increasing his heart rate and therefore pumping the mako in his blood that little bit faster, making his hearing a bit keener. All he needs to do is take a few deep breaths and he should be centred again.

He tries, he really does, but the music’s too loud and the lights are too bright, and even if they weren’t the report would still be in his hand.

Eventually the elevator stops and he’s pushing his way out, forcing the doors open before they even really start to move.

The next series of corridors pass like the first, in a blur of industrial black, grey, glass, and the occasional ostentatious gold glint of a Shinra sign catching the edge of his vision.

Finally, he reaches the data room. With it’s out of the way position and the nondescript door marking its entrance; if he hadn’t already known where it was—he knew for a fact Reno liked to haze new THIRDS by sending them on a hunt for this room—it could have taken him hours of near endless wondering to find it.

It’s because of this and the fact that their PHS’s have to be turned off while they’re in this room, that Zack knows he’ll find who he’s looking for behind the ill maintained and dusty door.

Raising a hand to trigger the automated release he suddenly finds himself pausing.

This is a bad idea, a very bad idea that is fuelled by anger and grief and loss.

He’d most likely only be making things worse by doing this.

Walking away now is the smart thing to do…

When has he ever let that stop him.

He hears what might be the ghost of an exasperated sigh; it’s probably just the release of pressure on the mechanised door.

The room appears to be empty; the only source of light is a few idle computer screens scattered amongst the rows of bookcases. The smell of dust and dry paper assaults him as he takes his first step into the shadowed paths, trying to ignore the sense of claustrophobia that seizes him as he delves deeper into the narrow passageways created by the towering bookcases.

He can tell when he’s getting close to his target; the dust gets thinner, there’s a little bit more light showing that the computer terminals are used for more than just burning up Mako energy, and the spaces between the bookcases are getting wider.

It's the shimmer of silver light in the relative darkness that finally reveals his prey.

Propped against the back wall in one of the few open spaces of the cavernous room stands Sephiroth. He’s just standing there, his arms folded against his chest and his head tilted slightly forward, so his hair is almost obscuring his face.

Zack’s not sure if his presence has been noticed yet. Actually, he’s not entirely sure whether Sephiroth is even awake, he looks the most relaxed and—dare he say it—unguarded Zack’s ever seen him.

Well, no…that’s a lie. He can remember more than a few moments where he’d seen Sephiroth completely at ease, the imposing tension that hung around him like a cloak missing, but that had been before, when…

Stepping forward he goes to clear his throat, but the sound of his boot shifting against the uncarpeted concrete is enough to alert the General.

His eyes are open and focused on Zack; the faint glow that all SOLDIERs possess and the cat like slit pupils that seem to be unique to him, making his gaze just that bit more intimidating in the wane light of the poorly lit room.

“Zack, did you need something?” His voice is so calm, as it always is. No inflections of distress, frustration, anger, or sorrow. Just a passive tone that does nothing to communicate any emotion.

Until this point Zack really hadn’t been sure what he was coming down here to do, but now…

He meets Sephiroth’s gaze.

“…Modeoheim was your mission?” He holds up the papers as he asks this but doesn’t look at them. Instead he keeps his eyes set on Sephiroth’s face, looking for something, anything.

“Yes.”

“You refused it and gave it to me.”

“Yes.”

That’s it.

Just one word delivered in the same monotone voice without the slightest change in his expression, or so much as a pause before he answers. Even then it’s the look in his eyes that really gets to Zack, the passive and steady stare that meets his own searching gaze head on.

This isn’t what he wanted.

He feels as though he’s buckling, like there’s a weight on his shoulders that he can’t hold up on his own, a weight that was placed there by the man whose standing so damn calmly before him.

His shoulders give way and he feels himself slumping forward. His eyes coming to rest on the floor because he just can’t take having to look at that level stare, it makes him feel as though he’s failing and he is, he knows he is but having someone else know…

This isn’t him.

This isn’t how things are supposed to be.

Everything’s ruined and—

It’s in that moment—when the maelstrom of his thoughts finally overwhelms him—that he snaps.

His hands fist in the smooth material of Sephiroth’s trademark coat, his grip so tight he can hear the leather creaking. Then he’s pushing, shoving forward and there’s no resistance, not until Sephiroth’s back hits the wall he was leaning against when Zack first found him. With the sound of straining rock and fracturing mortar the wall warps, a crater of spider web cracks forming with Sephiroth at its centre, but Zack doesn’t stop, he can’t stop.

“Coward!”

He looks up, expecting to see the same calm look in that steady mako green stare, to see his own image perfectly reflected in it. His face distorted with rage and pain and loss, so much loss, but that’s not what he sees.

Sephiroth isn’t able to hold his gaze this time and Zack would swear he could see the stoic set of his expression beginning to flicker. He wouldn’t have noticed it before, but now—with the way Sephiroth’s head tilts forward in an attempt to shield his face with the curtain of his hair—it looks as though he’s trying to hide.

“Yes.”

That same word again, even now, still delivered in that infuriatingly calm tone.

He feels tears begin to gather in the corners of his eyes and his vision blurs as he tries to blink them away, it doesn’t work. The first traitorous sob claws at the back of his throat even as he chokes it down.

His grip tightens on Sephiroth’s coat as he finally crumbles, his forehead coming to rest against the Generals chest as he hides his own face.

“You couldn’t…” no that’s not it. “You **wouldn’t** fight them—”

A shuddering breath causes his whole body to tremble and he’s pretty sure that it’s only his continued death grip that’s keeping him standing.

“So you used me—!”

The words, though shouted sound quiet to his ears, as though they are coming to him from down a long corridor instead of from his own mouth.

There’s a pause, filled only with the noise of his hitching breath and the loud tempo of his beating heart, but then the answer comes again.

“Yes.”

It’s spoken almost softly this time, with an edge of acceptance that leaves Zack feeling tired.

It’s not until his knees hit the cold floor that he realises Sephiroth has moved; slid slowly down the wall so their both sitting on the floor. Zack’s face is still hidden against his chest and with Sephiroth’s own shoulders sagging—his perfect posture nowhere to be seen—he almost feels like he’s being embraced.

It sucks in comparison to the hugs Angeal used to give him.

The lance of pain that sends stabbing through his chest leaves him gritting his teeth. It’s still too soon, the wound too raw, barely stopped bleeding never mind starting to heal.

The tears are flowing freely now.

“Bastard.”

It’s not fair, none of this is fair.

“Yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> So this fic was inspired by this gorgeous little comic that hit me right in the feels.  
> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/435824555823464449/703070310332891246/13be725fd77cb2f2437317e2f87dddd1.jpg  
> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/435824555823464449/703070336391839835/68e93068d31c2dd3b30d41b1520cbcca.jpg  
> https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/435824555823464449/703070352393371688/2484a8daf15555c61300c432f35ef3a2.jpg  
> All credit to the talented artist that drew these.  
> Anyway, kudos and comments are always appreciated.  
> In other words you may leave your soul shards at the door in the conveniently marked jar. Thanks!


End file.
